Western Kazakhstan has seen a number of bloody incidents as tensions have mounted over labor disputes and other social frictions in the past 18 months or so.

The first suicide bombing in Kazakh memory was reported in May 2011 in the western city of Aqtobe, injuring three people.

Less than six months later, bombers targeted a regional prosecutor's office in downtown Atyrau.

International rights group Human Rights Watch (HRW) recently accused the government in Astana and several oil firms of systematic violations of the rights of thousands of oil workers in the west of the country. HRW charged in a September 10 report that extended protests in 2011, which resulted in the killing of at least 16 workers by police and thousands of layoffs, highlighted a broader issue of “disregard for workers’ rights and other human rights.”